It’s amazing what a little bit of organization can do
No one likes to browse endless settings menus, especially as development continues to add extra features and functionality. A disorganized preferences menu can make even the most obvious settings feel like a task to change, and there is no better example of this than the current state of Google Assistant. Fortunately, the company is working on a total overhaul of Assistant’s settings menu, and is finally bringing an improved organization into the mix.
As it stands right now, Assistant’s settings are all dumped in a single list, organized alphabetically without any categorization. This method is, not surprisingly, a complete disaster to browse, often leaving users vague about where certain options are hidden. As discovered by 9to5Google through an APK demolition, Google is preparing to add three categories to the menu:
- Customize your assistant
- Get things done
- Manage apps and services
It’s a small change, even keeping the alphabetical order within each subcategory (minus, of course, General, which takes precedence over everything else in the Customize subheading). However, it does make things look and feel a little more manageable. Do you need to change something about your Assistant experience? It’s likely to fall into the Customize category. Are you trying to find your favorite music player? It is under Manage apps and services.
Some of the options within each category have also been changed and adapted. The cryptic name “You” will change to “Your Information” – and boy, does that make much more sense – “Hey Google & Voice Match” becomes “Access Your Assistant” and some new options host various similar categories . “Home and Family” is a perfect example, as Google has pushed home control, Face Match, Family Bell, assigned reminders, and parental control. The last two are particularly strange; the latter because, as 9to5 notes, it appears to be new, while the former will actually completely disappear from Assistant sometime in the near future.
There’s no specific launch window for when this redesigned menu can roll out, but it’s such a massive improvement that we can only hope it comes soon.
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